An Idle Mind

Peter Beinart Editorial on the Tea Party

A new New York Times poll shows Tea Partiers are grumpy, older, well-off Americans who think white people are oppressed—in other words, Republicans.

“Populist,” like “idealist,” is one of those words reporters use when they’ve checked their critical faculties at the door. George W. Bush routinely gets called an “idealist” in foreign policy because he gave soaring speeches on behalf of democracy. Whether his actions—in Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Central Asia, the horn of Africa, or for that matter, Washington, D.C.—were particularly idealistic usually escapes scrutiny. He said he was for democracy, therefore he was.

It’s the same with “populist.” Every time someone compares Barack Obama to Chairman Mao, the press garlands him with the word. But historically, the standards for what constitutes populism have been a little higher. In American history, populism has a specific meaning: It’s our non-Marxist way of talking about class. Being a populist means standing up for the little guy against ruling elites. Hating Washington isn’t enough, or else J.P. Morgan would have been a populist when he fumed that Theodore Roosevelt was busting his trusts. You have to be angry on behalf of the underdog.

The Tea Partiers aren’t standing up for the little guy; they’re standing up to the little guy.

Which is why we now have scientific proof that Tea Partiers don’t deserve the label. According to a survey in Thursday’s New York Times, Tea Partiers are wealthier and better-educated than average Americans. They’re not today’s version of the Nebraska dirt farmers who rose up against the railroads and the banks more than a century ago. They’re today’s version of the California suburbanites who rose up against their property tax bills in the late 1970s rather than pay for decent schools for the Golden State’s black and Hispanic kids. They’re the second coming of what Robert Kuttner called “the revolt of the haves.”

The Tea Partiers aren’t standing up for the little guy; they’re standing up to the little guy. We’ve long known that their leaders, like Sarah Palin, opposed against real regulation of Wall Street. Now we learn that what the Tea Partiers dislike about Barack Obama’s economic policies is that they don’t do enough for the rich. According to the Times, Tea Partiers are more likely than other Americans to think Barack Obama’s policies favor the poor, and they’re mad as heck about it. Not exactly William Jennings Bryan stuff.

The Tea Partiers aren’t too fond of racial underdogs either. They’re more likely than other Americans to believe that the Obama administration favors blacks over whites, and that black people’s hardships have been exaggerated. America does have a history of right-wing, often racist, populism. Segregationist Alabama Governor George Wallace ran as a populist in the American Independent Party in 1968. But at least Wallace’s economic views were reasonably progressive. The Tea Partiers favor the economically and racially privileged. They fail the populism test on both counts.

So the press has a problem: what to call this intriguing new force in American politics? What kind of adjective suits older, grumpy, well-off Americans who believe Democrats are communists, the poor have it too easy and white people are oppressed? The term “Republican” comes to mind.

Debt Reducing Game

http://xbox360.ign.com/articles/108/1083862p1.html

WHAAAAAT

NY Times Op-Ed : Krugman

Krugman’s NY Times Op-ed

“Fear Strikes Out”

The day before Sunday’s health care vote, President Obama gave an unscripted talk to House Democrats. Near the end, he spoke about why his party should pass reform: “Every once in a while a moment comes where you have a chance to vindicate all those best hopes that you had about yourself, about this country, where you have a chance to make good on those promises that you made … And this is the time to make true on that promise. We are not bound to win, but we are bound to be true. We are not bound to succeed, but we are bound to let whatever light we have shine.”

 And on the other side, here’s what Newt Gingrich, the Republican former speaker of the House — a man celebrated by many in his party as an intellectual leader — had to say: If Democrats pass health reform, “They will have destroyed their party much as Lyndon Johnson shattered the Democratic Party for 40 years” by passing civil rights legislation.

I’d argue that Mr. Gingrich is wrong about that: proposals to guarantee health insurance are often controversial before they go into effect — Ronald Reagan famously argued that Medicare would mean the end of American freedom — but always popular once enacted.

But that’s not the point I want to make today. Instead, I want you to consider the contrast: on one side, the closing argument was an appeal to our better angels, urging politicians to do what is right, even if it hurts their careers; on the other side, callous cynicism. Think about what it means to condemn health reform by comparing it to the Civil Rights Act. Who in modern America would say that L.B.J. did the wrong thing by pushing for racial equality? (Actually, we know who: the people at the Tea Party protest who hurled racial epithets at Democratic members of Congress on the eve of the vote.)

And that cynicism has been the hallmark of the whole campaign against reform.

Yes, a few conservative policy intellectuals, after making a show of thinking hard about the issues, claimed to be disturbed by reform’s fiscal implications (but were strangely unmoved by the clean bill of fiscal health from the Congressional Budget Office) or to want stronger action on costs (even though this reform does more to tackle health care costs than any previous legislation). For the most part, however, opponents of reform didn’t even pretend to engage with the reality either of the existing health care system or of the moderate, centrist plan — very close in outline to the reform Mitt Romney introduced in Massachusetts — that Democrats were proposing.

Instead, the emotional core of opposition to reform was blatant fear-mongering, unconstrained either by the facts or by any sense of decency.

It wasn’t just the death panel smear. It was racial hate-mongering, like a piece in Investor’s Business Daily declaring that health reform is “affirmative action on steroids, deciding everything from who becomes a doctor to who gets treatment on the basis of skin color.” It was wild claims about abortion funding. It was the insistence that there is something tyrannical about giving young working Americans the assurance that health care will be available when they need it, an assurance that older Americans have enjoyed ever since Lyndon Johnson — whom Mr. Gingrich considers a failed president — pushed Medicare through over the howls of conservatives.

And let’s be clear: the campaign of fear hasn’t been carried out by a radical fringe, unconnected to the Republican establishment. On the contrary, that establishment has been involved and approving all the way. Politicians like Sarah Palin — who was, let us remember, the G.O.P.’s vice-presidential candidate — eagerly spread the death panel lie, and supposedly reasonable, moderate politicians like Senator Chuck Grassley refused to say that it was untrue. On the eve of the big vote, Republican members of Congress warned that “freedom dies a little bit today” and accused Democrats of “totalitarian tactics,” which I believe means the process known as “voting.”

Without question, the campaign of fear was effective: health reform went from being highly popular to wide disapproval, although the numbers have been improving lately. But the question was, would it actually be enough to block reform?

And the answer is no. The Democrats have done it. The House has passed the Senate version of health reform, and an improved version will be achieved through reconciliation.

This is, of course, a political victory for President Obama, and a triumph for Nancy Pelosi, the House speaker. But it is also a victory for America’s soul. In the end, a vicious, unprincipled fear offensive failed to block reform. This time, fear struck out.

Krugman — ftw 

Early Toy Story 3 Reactions via /film:

FirstShowing: “it is a very wild ride. It’s actually a great story that has a few twists and turns and deviates from the norm quite a bit, but it’s still as great as any other movie from Pixar. I did really enjoy it and have a fun time watching it, but that’s really all there was, nothing more to make it extraordinary. It’s a bit hard to say, because I love Pixar so much, but it felt like this lacked the same magic of Pixar movies of past (at least up until the ending). But if you love the Toy Story movies, you’re going to love this one, too.”

CinemaBlend: “[when the print is finished] I think we’ll be having a conversation about the Pixar legacy, about how groundbreaking their work has become in the last few years and whether or not revisiting the movie where it all began was the right step for a company that, at its best, can legitimately be called avant garde. As much as I loved seeing all the toys again, I’m not 100% sure that this adventure– as entertaining and lovely as it was– was the right one for Pixar at this moment. Toy Story 3 takes many big risks, and twists your heart around as much as Wall-E and Up, but at times it felt far safer than what we’ve come to expect from them.  And yet, I guarantee you will enjoy this film.”

ComingSoon: “Like the best Pixar movies, it’s consistently funny, exciting and moving, sometimes all three at the same time, and as someone who never got around to seeing Toy Story 2 and really had very little emotional investment in the characters, I was really impressed with what was done with a fairly simple story that doesn’t require having seen either of the previous movies to immediately understand the idea of growing up and losing interest in one’s toys. ” … “here are also moments as emotional as those in Up without ever feeling sentimental. I’ll also freely admit to being close to tears a number of times while watching it, which is a true testament to what Unkrich and his team of talented creators have done in making these toys feel so human, yet making the human characters feel even more real than what we normally see in animated films.”

Latino Review: “Lee Unkrich put his co-directing gigs behind him and gave us a fantastic end to the series. All of the toys were present (except for a few, which is explained in the film) and the movie looked great.” … “The last act had some around me crying, probably thinking back to when they had favorite toys of their own growing up.”

Pixar can do no wrong — except for Cars 

This is going to sound incredibly creepy, but…

jameshatescoal:

I’m trying to find some people for a photo project that I’m doing.

Basically, I need a bunch of people to get naked in a forest.

I don’t know when I’m going to be doing this, or if I’ll find enough people, but if you wanna get nekkid in the woods get up with me.

…golly that sounded creepy.

I’d love to pose naked for you, James. It would be beautiful..